16 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[January, 
THE FAVORITE HORSE. — Engraved for the American Agriculturist. 
A Good Horse— Notes on Thorough-Breds 
The mental and physical qualities of a good 
horse are too "well known to need enumeration. 
For the former we love him, call him noble, 
faithful, generous, willing, and kind, while his 
strength, endurance, and speed, make him a 
most valuable servant ; and it is only in the 
abuse of his gifts that any thing but good 
comes to man. Mentally the horse has few 
equals among the brutes, and among horses, the 
ihorough-bred exhibits the highest intelligence 
and -quickness of perception — accommodating 
himself most readily to the exigences of the 
moment, whatever they may be ; avoiding diffi- 
culties, and extricating himself from them when 
unavoidably encountered. The ability to be 
vicious, whether brought into exercise or not, 
may be classed among the moral qualities of a 
horse, as distinguished from the intellectual ; so 
also what is called honesty and its opposite 
treachery, restiveness and patience, with many 
others. The thorough-bred horse is also dis- 
tinguished in these respects, and whether the 
good or evil traits be developed, depends almost 
wholly upon the men with whom he associates. 
In his physical nature the thorough-bred is uni- 
versally recognised as the best of this greatly 
varying species. In fact, it maybe asserted that 
in every respect, in every part of the world, 
(except perhaps within the arctic Circle,) for 
every purpose (allowance being made for weight) 
he has no equal among horses. His bone is 
firmest and finest in texture, his muscle is 
tensest and most elastic, his sinews hardest 
and most firmly attached, his frame close knit 
and compact, his nerves high strung but under 
his control, his brain large, his chest capacious, 
and his form the perfection of equine symmetry. 
A sentiment, which horse-men the world over 
will endorse, is attributed to Sir John Fenwick, 
who uttered it some" 200 years ago. It is this: 
"Every thorough-bred, or 'blood-horse,' even if 
he be the meanest hack that ever came out of 
Barbaiy, is so infinitely superior in courage, 
stoutness, and quality, both of bone and sinew, 
as well as blood, to the best cold-blooded mare 
that ever went on a shodden hoof, that he can 
not fail to improve her stock, whatever be his 
comparative standing among racers." 
A thorough-bred or blood horse, be it re- 
membered, is one descended, through a line of 
English racers, from the blood of the Desert, 
including the pure Arabian, and also the 
Barb, Turk, Persian, and Syrian, which all pos- 
sess the same general characteristics, and trace 
their origin to Arab blood or to crosses with it. 
No horse is recognized as thorough-bred which 
does not bear a pedigree going back without a 
flaw to this Oriental source. The presence of 
an}' " cold blood," as that of all other horses is 
called, even though there be no more than 
l-32nd or l-64th, vitiates the purity of the blood 
of any animal, and he with his progeny loses all 
title to this proud designation. The thorough- 
bred, while we claim for him symmetry and 
beauty of form, abstractly considered, does not 
possess the style, elegance, and solidity, prized 
in a carriage horse ; nor that practical busi- 
ness look, combining an appearance of strength 
and speed, which we demand in a roadster ; he 
lacks also the massive strength which weight 
gives, and which we value in the horse of all 
work, no less when he is used in the dray, than 
before the plow. The "terrible glory of his 
nostrils" he possesses, but the "neck clothed 
with thunder" belongs more peculiarly to some 
of the heavier breeds. There is, then, an ele- 
gance of strength and style, a certain pride of 
action and beauty of fitness for certain kinds of 
labor, which give great value to other breeds, 
particularly when their blood is blended with 
that of the thorough-bred. The fine engraving 
which we present, shows very strikingly these 
points of beauty and elegance alluded to, com- 
bined with some of those fine qualities which 
indicate " blood," and affords us an opportunity 
to enforce the lesson that blood on the part of 
the sire serves to develop and refine the good 
qualities of the dam as imparted to their off- 
spring. The points to be sought in a breeding 
mare are : size, beauty of form, together with ca- 
pacity of barrel and pelvis, freedom from con 
stitutional or hereditary defects, as well as from 
a perverse irritability of disposition. In the 
horse, let us remember that the more blood we 
have, the better, and that a thorough-bred is of 
course better than the best cold-blooded or 99- 
lOOths-blooded horse we can breed from. The 
good points of the Morgans and Black-Hawks, 
which are so much used now-a-days as stock- 
getters, are chiefly due to blood, and were we 
to return to the use of thorough-breds so much 
as possible, we should at once see a commen- 
surate improvement in our stock. The use of 
thorough-bred stallions ought to be so persis- 
tently encouraged by our agricultural societies, 
that all who can will secure their services. 
